United States

United States

"but come, ye sons of Liberty, Columbia's offspring, brave as free, In danger's hour still flaming in the van: Ye know, and dare maintain, The Royalty of Man."

Robert Burns , To George Washington on his birthday, 1794

Updated on 7.4.12

Come, let the solemn, soothing Mass be said, For the soldier-souls of the patriot dead . . .

But if high the praise, be as deep the wail O'er the exiled sons of the warlike Gael. . . .

Proud beats the heart, while it sorrowing melts O'er the death-won fame of the truthful Celts.

For the scattered graves, over which we pray Will shine like stars on their race always. . .

-- From John Savage's Requiem for the Fallen of the Irish Brigade (Jan. 16, 1864)

It is almost impossible to list all of the fascinating important people who helped to steer America through its history that were of Celtic descent, mainly because there were so many of them. To call America "New Scotland", or "New Ireland", or "New Wales" was tried at times, and fittingly, along with "New Caledonia", or "New Hibernia". The USA was so tremendously influenced by these groups that the name "New Celtica" would've sufficed nicely.This information was taken from internet sources and the references listed here.

Explorers

Pre-Columbus

Saga America and America B.C. by Professor Barry Fell of Harvard University, also Cyrus Gordon's Before Columbus and They All Discovered America byCharles Boreland;

"Christopher Columbus, as everyone knows, is honoured by posterity because he was the last to discover America."... James Joyce

871BC 8th August Celtic Old Gaelic Ogham inscriptions with Solstice markings in Throne Cave in North America in Oklahoma! Carbon dated to 900BC. Martin Brennan. see video at this site. There is dramatic and revolutionary evidence that there was an ancient Celtic presence in America's heartland perhaps even before the time of Christ. Ogham symbols, like those in Ireland but without the vowels, have been found at sites in Southeastern Colorado and the Oklahoma Panhandle. Here, Brennan discusses with film-maker Scott Monahan the Anubis Cave, one of two side-by-side caves (the other called the Nosepointer cave), which, Brennan points out, resemble a skull-like image. They visited the site on Monday, March 19th, at the time of Spring Equinox, and witnessed the shadows cast by the setting sun as they crossed over various etchings and carvings on the rear of the cave. One of this author's major discoveries in Ireland was at Cairn T, Loughcrew, in 1980, where he and his team rediscovered that site's alignment to the rising equinox sun.

500 BCE Celts traveled with Carthaginians who traded with New World in 500 BC. Carthage had a good working relationship with the numerous Celts who populated Spain, France, and the British Isles, often hiring them as soldiers. Along the Atlantic seaboard of the Americas a number of stone "steles" (monuments) have been found, usually inscribed in Punic, and many have the name of Hanno -the admiral sent out from Carthage with the express mission of exploration and colonization about 500 BC. In northeastern Pennsylvania near the town of Hawley, one of these stone steles was found, inscribed in Punic ("This monument placed by Hanno, do not deface"). The Syracusan (Greek 100bc) historian Diodorus said the Carthaginians had a "large island" which was located "far out in the Atlantic ocean" - on which there were "many mountains" and "large navigable rivers". Carthage coin mapfrom New Views article-geologist Mark McMenamin

Celtic tradersreach North America from 100BC-500 AD and leave Ogham texts in rock faces in West Virginia. In 1964 two amateur archaeologists unearthed a stone carving in Wyoming County, West Virginia, that boasted an inscription ten foot in length. They assumed it was the work of American Indians but its meaning eluded them. Many years later, word of this find reached the enormously respected ears of the late Dr. Robert Fell, President of Harvard’s Epigraphic Society. It took him all of a minute to work out that the inscription was an advanced form of Ogham. He translated the message into Old Irish, then into modern Irish and then into English. It read as follows:

"At the time of sunrise, a ray grazes the notch on the left side on Christmas Day, the first season of the year, the season of the blessed advent of the savior Lord Christ. Behold he is born of Mary, a woman."

The Christmas Day carving has been dated to between 500 and 700AD. Dr. Fell and his colleagues then looked at their watches, made some calculations and reunited beside the carving just before sunrise on December 22nd 1982. And here they watched in amazement as the first shaft of sunlight came powering through the sky like a torch beam and struck the centre of a Celtic sun symbol on the left side of the panel. Gradually the entire carving lit up and the inscription exploded to life.

Circa 460CE Saint Brendan: Brendan is said to have sailed in the Fourth Century AD in search of a fabled Paradise with a company of monks, the number of which is variously stated as from 18 to 150. After a long voyage of seven years they reached the "Terra Repromissionis", or Paradise, a most beautiful land with luxuriant vegetation. St. Brendan (or Brandan) was an Irish monk, born about 484 B.C. in Tralee. According to medieval legend, Brendan embarked on a seven-year voyage through the Atlantic in search of the Garden of Eden. The legends recount Brendan's amazing adventures, including his encounter with a whale, pictured left, upon whose back he held communion. Brendan and his band of monks eventually discovered a brightly-lit land through which flowed a great river. After wandering the land for 40 days in an unsuccessful search for the farthest shore, they filled their ships with precious gems and returned home. Brendan died soon afterward, but his fabulous island became a standard feature on maps for the next millennia. The Navigatio Brendani, which dates from the 11th century, contains the earliest surviving version of this story. St. Brendan's search for Paradise

According to legend, the first Welsh emigrants to the New World were Madog ab Owain Gwynedd (Prince Madog)and a band of settlers disillusioned with their lives in 12th century Wales.

Wales must have been a depressing place for Madog, he was born one of six illegitimate children of King Owain of Gwynedd - who also had 13 legitimate children as well. Add to this the state of constant warfare Gwynedd was plunged into when Owain died and his male children fought amongst themselves for the kingship, and Wales must have seemed like hell to the peaceable prince. To escape the fighting he set out on an epic and courageous voyage to find a new home. He and his brother Riryd set sail from a quay on the River Ganol, in what is known as Rhos-on-Sea today, in two ships - the Gorn Gwynant and the Pedr Sant. They sailed west and landed at what is now known as Mobile Bay, in the state of Alabama in the US in 1169.America must have seemed like Paradise to Madog because he returned to Wales to collect more settlers and in 1170 ten more ships gathered at Lundy Island in the Bristol Channel to head into the west once again. They never returned to Wales.Supposedly, on arrival in America they navigated the great river system that feeds into Mobile Bay, settling initially in the southern states of Georgia, Tennessee and Kentucky. Some people contend that archaeological evidence found in the area - there are stone forts there - supports the historical validity of the legend. However, Madog, in trying to escape war in his native Wales found himself in the position of having to make war on the local Cheyenne tribe in order to survive. The settlers decided to return down river in 1186, but were ambushed at the falls on the Ohio River where Louisville, Kentucky now stands. They negotiated a truce, but had to promise the Cheyenne that they would never return to the area.They made their way down river to the Mississippi, which they followed upstream to the Missouri. They finally settled and integrated with a tribe living on the banks of the Missouri called the Mandans.The Mandan tribe are at the centre of the Madog legend in America - fuelling stories of tribes of tall, fair-haired, Celtic Indians that speak a language similar to Welsh, live in round huts and navigate the rivers of the New World in round boats like coracles.

A team of leading independent historians and researchers announced in 1998 that Radio Carbon dating evidence, and the discovery of ancient British style artefacts and inscriptions in the American Midwest, provided, "the strongest indications yet" that Welsh explorers, under the Prince Madoc ap Meurig, arrived in the country during the 6th Century and set up colonies there. Research team members have known the location of burial sites of Madoc's close relatives in Wales for some time, DNA evidence could provide vital new leads, they say. Many of the grave mounds found in the American mid West, including those at Bat Creek, Tennessee, are ancient British in origin and design, Wilson said. Jim Michael added, "the stone tablet found at Bat Creek in 1889 included an inscription written in Coelbren, an ancient British alphabet known and recorded by historians and bards down the ages." Wilson said that his research had brought him into contact with very similar alphabet inscriptions in Britain, Europe and the Middle East. "The components of the alphabet derive from the earliest days of the Khumric (Welsh) people," he added, "and were used along their migration routes to Wales in antiquity." Wilson's research partner, Baram A. Blackett, said, "once we discovered the cipher for the alphabet in recorded in texts dating to the 1500s we knew we were in business. We have translated many of these inscriptions and they all make perfect sense." Jim Michael commented that the final translation for the Bat Creek tablet was an exciting business, "especially when we knew it read, 'Madoc the ruler he is'." Some historians have written off the evidence for Prince Madoc, the Welsh Prince who sailed to America circa 562 (AD). "They often give a false date of 1170 and this legend has replaced the facts," added Wilson

1396-Prince Henry Sinclair, Earl of Orkney leads the last Norse-Celtic Atlantic Expedition, landing in New England in 1396, almost one hundred years before Columbus. Affiliated with the legendary Knights Templar, stories/legends persist that St Clair buried remarkable treasures in Nova Scotia, possibly the Grail itself. In 1398, Sir John Gunn dies in Massachusetts, where his rockcut memorial and arms may still be seen. Sinclair builds a Tower at Newport, which remains to this day. The Atlantic journeyThe Sinclair Voyage

1492Christopher Columbus sails to the New World, William Eris (or Ayers), a man from Galway, is reportedly amongst the crew. He is said to be one of the forty volunteers left behind in Hispaniola and apparently killed by Indians after Columbus' departure.

In 1492, William Ayers, an Irishman undoubtedly familiar with English activities, sailed with Columbus on the Santa Maria

Post-Columbian

1497 John Cabot re-discovers Newfoundland

1540 Tamas Blaque, known to his own Scottish countrymen as Tom Blake, traveled with Spanish Conquistador Francisco Vasquez de Coronado in 1540 looking for the Seven Cities of Gold. Tom married the widowed Francisca de Rivera of New Spain. The son of William Blake and Agnes Mowat, He described himself as a subject of the King of Scotland. He held an audience with the Spanish Viceroy in 1550 where it was recorded in discussion that Tom had arrived in Mexico in 1534 after taking part in the conquest of New Granada with Alonso de Heredera in 1532. While with Coronado, Tom was one of the first white men to gaze upon the Grand Canyon, and is documented as being the first white man to enter what is now Utah. Heavenly Horsesmen who traveled with Coronado

1652 Cromwell confiscates land from those who participated in a rebellion. A list of inhabitants of most of the southern part of County Dublin is assembled. up to 80,000 of Irish men and women were involuntarily "transported" as slave laborers to the West Indies by Cromwell's forces. Called "redlegs," many of these people and their mixed-race descendents later moved to the United States, explaining the millions of blacks with Irish heritage and names.

1677 Charles McCarthy from Cork leads a party of 48 Irish immigrants in founding a colony at East Greenwich, Rhode Island.

1678 About 100 Irish families sail from Barbados to Virginia and the Carolinas.

1682-1683 Religious persecution in Scotland prompted many to leave their homeland in the early 17th Century. Early settlements were established by these colonists in East Jersey in 1683 (now eastern and northern Jersey) and in South Carolina in 1682. .Sir John Cochran and Sir George Campbell started a Scottish colony along the Royal River in Carolina with a group of Presbyterians in 1682. The next year the group was joined by more from Ayrshire and Ulster led by Ferguson and Dunlop.

1682Quakers move from Wales to Pennsylvania. After 1660 when Charles II was restored to the English throne, he instigated a wave of religious intolerance which threatened the rights of several groups to worship in the way that they chose, and significant numbers of people - in some cases, whole communities - began to leave Wales. The Court of Great Sessions in Bala, north Wales threatened to burn Quakers, prompting the Welsh Quakers to acquire land (approximately 40,000 acres) in and around what is now Pennsylvania. They emigrated there in 1682.

1683Baptists from mid and west Wales made the journey to Philadelphia, where they settled and acquired 30,000 acres of land on the banks of the Delaware River.

1717 The beginning of the mass migration of Ulster-Scots to the American Colonies. By 1775 at least a quarter of a million people had fled and with their dependants made up 15% of the non-Indian Americans.

1720 Noting that some 2,600 Irishmen had arrived in Boston during the past three years, the governor of Massachusetts complained of the "public burden" imposed by the coming of "so many poor people from abroad, especially those that come from Ireland". The General Court of Massachusetts warned immigrants from Ireland to leave the colony within seven months.

1721-1742 Over 3,000 immigrants arrive in 21 years in the U.S. from Ulster alone.

1729-1776 12,000 Highlanders settled in and around Cape Fear, North Carolina.

1736Darien, Georgia Scottish settlement. Darien was settled on 19 January 1736 by a band of 160 or so Scottish Highlanders recruited by General James Oglethorpe from the area of Inverness and the Strathnaver (Sunderland), Scotland. The original name of the town was, in fact, New Inverness, until it was later changed in memory of the ill-fated Scottish expedition to the Darien Isthmus, Panama; in 1697.

1737 The Charitable Irish Society was formed on St. Patrick's Day in Boston by 26 Irish immigrants "to aid unfortunate countrymen, to cultivate a spirit of unity and harmony among all Irishmen in Massachusetts colony and their descendants, and to advance their interests socially and morally." This is now the oldest Irish society in the U.S.

1776 Men of Irish birth or descent formed between one-third to one-half of the American Revolutionary forces, including 1,492 officers and 26 generals.

1790 The first census of the United States records 44,000 Irish-born residents, more than half of whom lived south of Pennsylvania. Historians consider this figure to be lower than reality.

1791 James Hoban, a native of Kilkenny, designs the White House, modeled upon Leinster House in Dublin.

1795 Llanbrynmair, in Montgomery,Wales, provided another wave of emigrants in 1795, and the first real Welsh colony, Cambria in western Pennsylvania, in which the Welsh language, culture and religion was maintained in a community with a distinct Welsh identity was established there by Morgan John Rhys, a Baptist minister from Glamorgan at around the same time.

1803-1807 On February 28, 1803, President Thomas Jefferson won approval from Congress for a visionary project, an endeavor that would become one of America’s greatest stories of adventure. Twenty-five hundred dollars were appropriated to fund a small expeditionary group, whose mission was to explore the uncharted West. Jefferson called the group the Corps of Discovery. It would be led by Jefferson’s secretary, Meriwether Lewis, and Lewis’ friend, William Clark.Over the next four years, the Corps of Discovery would travel thousands of miles, experiencing lands, rivers and peoples that no Americans ever had before.

Gregor MacGregor. On a bluff overlooking the Amelia River near Jacksonville, Florida, Fort San Carlos was completed by the Spanish in 1816. The fort was made of wood and earthworks and was armed with eight or ten guns. As the Spanish Empire disintegrated, Fort San Carlos became increasingly vulnerable to foreign intervention. Commissioned by representatives of revolting South American countries to liberate Florida from Spanish control, Sir Gregor MacGregor seized the fort in June, 1817. Declaring himself "Emperor of Florida", he ruled Amelia Island for less than thrity days.

1820-1830 50,000 Irish immigrants enter the United States

1830-1840 237,000 Irish immigrants enter the United States.

1845-1855 Irish Potato Famine. More than 2,000,000 Irish men and women emigrate; 800,000 Irish immigrants enter the United States between 1845-1847

1850's more settlers left Llanbrynmair, Wales, led by the Rev. Samuel Roberts who acquired land for a Welsh colony in Tennessee.

Explorers of the highest magnitude!

20 July 1969, Neil Armstrong became the first human being to set foot on the moon. Armstrong was a veteran aviator: he had flown 78 combat missions over Korea as a Navy fighter pilot, then joined NASA as a civilian test pilot. Armstrong was the pilot of the Gemini 8 mission (launched 16 March 1966) and then was named commander for the Apollo 11 mission of 1969. Along with crewmates Michael Collins and Buzz Aldrin, Armstrong flew to the moon; while Collins circled the moon in the command module Columbia, Armstrong and Aldrin landed on the lunar surface in the lunar module Eagle.Armstrong was the first to step onto the moon's surface, uttering the famous phrase "That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind." Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the Moon, took a scrap of Armstrong "tartan" with him on his historic space flight of 1969, in tribute to his Border forbears, who would have gone a-reiving by the light of that very moon on which he left the first footprints (Scotsman, Sept. 2001).

Of the Twelve men that walked on the face of the Moon, eight were of Celtic bloodlines. Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, Alan Bean, Edgar Mitchell, David Scott, James Irwin (deceased 1991), and John Young are of Scottish descent and Gene Cernan's name is of Irish origin. The four others are Peter Conrad (deceased 1999) and Harrison Schmidt (German), Charles Duke (French but with Aberdeen connections) and Alan Shepard (deceased 1998)(English).

BRIAN BINNIE

Brian Binnie is a Program Business Manager and Test Pilot at Scaled Composites. He has 21 years flight test experience including 20 years of Naval Service in the Strike-Fighter community. He has logged over 4600 hours of flight time in 59 different aircraft and is a licensed Airline Transport Pilot. Brian’s educational background includes a B.S. in Aerospace Engineering and an M.S. in Fluid Mechanics and Thermodynamics from Brown University and an M.S. in Aeronautical Engineering from Princeton University. He is a graduate of the U.S. Navy’s Test Pilot School at Patuxent River, MD and the Naval Aviation Safety School at Monterey CA. He is a member of the Society of Experimental Test Pilots and a published member of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. He has logged hours in F/A-18's, A-6E, A-7E,and the SpaceShip One. Binnie was born in West Lafayette, Indiana, where his Scottish father was a professor of physics at Purdue University. The family returned to Scotland when Binnie was five, and lived in Aberdeen (his father taught at Aberdeen University) and later in Stirling[1]. When Binnie was a teenager the family moved to Boston [2].

Astronaut Brian Binnie rides on SpaceShipOne after his suborbital flight wins the Ansari X Prize in Mojave, California, on Monday.

Billy Powell aka Osceola 1804-1838 Osceola was not born a chief nor was he ever so named by formal election. He was born in Georgia, near the Chattahoochee River, in the country of the Creeks, near Tuskogee, Alabama. His name means Black Drink Crier (Asi-YaHolo). His lineage is disputed, but biographers Hartley in 1973 and Wickman in 1991 both refer to Tom Woodward's lineage of Osceola. A Scot named James McQueen lived with the Creeks from 1716 till 1811 when he died at the age of 128. He had married a Tallassee woman and had many children, two of which were Peter McQueen (great-Uncle and chief in his own right), and Ann. Ann married a half-breed named Copinger and had a daughter named Polly. Polly Copinger then married William Powell, a Scot trader and their son was named Billy, later known as Osceola. Osceola always maintained that he was full-blooded, but that was because his mother had told him that Creek and Seminole followed Matriarchal lineage....the male did not count: " You are Muskogee because I am. I am because my mother is." In actuality, Osceola has Scottish lineage on both sides: McQueen on his Mothers and Powell on his fathers. The male on the mothers side is of the most influence and that was his great uncle Talmuches Hadjo aka Peter McQueen.

Nation Building

Scots have played their part in the political history of the United States. More than one hundred governors of pre-Revolutionary colonies and post Revolutionary States were of Scottish birth or descent. 35 US Supreme Court Justices have been Scots. Nearly half of the Secretaries of the US Treasury and one third of the Secretaries of State have been of Scots origin. Of the fifty-six signatories of the Declaration of Independence, nine were directly or indirectly descended from Scots. 9 out of 13 Governors of the newly created United States were Scots or of Scottish descent. Of fifty judges of the Supreme Court from 1759-1882 at least fifteen were of Scottish ancestry.

The ancestry of George Washington, Virginia planter, American general, victorious commander-in-chief of the Colonial Forces and unopposed first president of the USA, has been traced back to the Scottish King Malcolm II. This grand, indomitable and immensely popular father of the USA, who is so colorfully described in Alistair Cooke's America*, chose as the four members of his first cabinet Thomas Jefferson as secretary of state, Alexander Hamilton as secretary of treasury, Henry Knox as secretary of war and Edmund Randolph as attorney general. All four were of Scots descent.

General John Forbes: founder of Pittsburgh, mentor to George Washington. General John Forbes was a genuine British and American hero and made a significant contribution to their military history less than two decades before the American Revolution. He secured a large portion of the United States for the British Crown. He ensured the military and political future of America's first President. He made it possible for Colonel George Washington, as he was then, to meet his future wife, then the young widow Mrs. Martha Custis, daughter of John Dandridge, a gentleman of Virginia. Near Aliquippa, Pennsylvania, where the French and Indians had established formidable defenses, Forbes roused himself from a fever to take personal command. What he, Colonel Washington and their subordinates saw there, on the French perimeters, was sickening - the skeletons and impaled skulls of the defeated British and American forces led by General Braddock. For some men of less stature it might have been regarded as an omen. For General Forbes it was an outrage that sparked his fiery Scottish soul to heights of fury, to seek and get revenge in full measure. In intricately planned pincer movements devised by the General himself, the combined British American forces fell on the French and Indians. The British Army inflicted such a complete defeat in October 1758 that the French campaign was never again attempted. On November 25, 1758, General Forbes and Colonel Washington stood side by side as their troops marched into Aliquippa, to take formal possession of the land where two rivers - the Monongahela and Allegheny - meet to form a mighty third - the Ohio. At this place, they renamed the small town, originally the name of a ruling Indian Queen. It was an impressive sight as the newly arrived army, wearing brilliant uniforms, marched in four columns, with flags flying and drums beating. They reached the camping ground, halted and took possession, while Colonel John Armstrong raised the flag, the Union Jack, over the British territory. General John Forbes duly claimed, in his own words, "this prodigious tract of fine, rich country" in the name of his king. He and his army of several thousand had marched over rough, rugged Allegheny mountains and endured much in the way of hazards and hardships. November 25, 1758, was of such great importance that London rejoiced and both New York and Philadelphia joined in the celebrations with military parades of their own. An American military historian recorded the event thus: "As the banner of England floated over the waters, the place, at the suggestion of General Forbes, was with one voice called Pittsburgh. It is the most enduring monument to the famous English statesman William Pitt, the Peacemaker. Long as the Monongahela and Allegheny shall flow to form the Ohio; long as the English tongue shall be the language of freedom in the boundless valley which their waters traverse, his name shall stand inscribed on the Gateway of the West." General John Forbes was one of the most renowned military heroes in the history of the Forbes Clan.

Nine Irish-American Presidents : Jackson, Polk, Buchanan, Grant, Nixon, Arthur, Wilson, Kennedy, Reagan. Notice that Polk, Arthur, Wilson and Grant are also claimed by the Scots, probably because they had both heritages.

The influence that many of the Welsh immigrants had on the emergence of modern America belies their relatively small numbers - sixteen of the signatories of the Declaration of Independence were of Welsh descent.

Welsh-American Presidents such as Thomas Jefferson, (whose family came from a village beneath Snowdon), James Monroe, Abraham Lincoln, and more recently Calvin Coolidge and Richard Nixon had their family roots in Wales.

Robert Dinwiddie Born 1693. Born near Glasgow, was the Lieutenant-Governor of Virginia. He insisted that the colonies should raise money for their own protection. Discovered George Washington's talents and sent him to resist the French. Thus he was an important figure in American History and has been called the "Grandfather of the United States"

John Muir He was born in Dunbar on the 21st April 1838 and emigrated to the United States along with his family in 1849. Founder of the US National Park system and the Sierra Club.

James Wilson Some historians consider James Wilson the greatest of all U.S. secretaries of agriculture. In tenure and accomplishment, he set records that have never been equaled. Wilson was born August 16, 1835 in Ayrshire, Scotland.

Jack Kennedy, 35th President of the United States and of Irish descent. A WWII hero, Jack was a very popular Senator and Congressman in Massachusetts. He was elected President in 1960. He created the Peace Corps, supported the Moon Missions, and handled the Cuban Missile Crisis. He was assassinated in 1963.

Henry FordThe son of an Irish emigrant from Co Cork, Ford was born on a farm in Dearborn, Michigan, but disliked farm life. When he was 15, he went to Detroit and trained as a machinist. Henry began to experiment with a "horseless carriage" about 1890 and completed building his first car, the quadricycle, in 1896. But it was not until 1903 that he founded the company that still bears his name.

Andrew Carnegie was born in Dunfermline, Scotland, on November 25, 1835. The son of a weaver, he came with his family to the United States in 1848 and settled in Allegheny, Pennsylvania. At age thirteen, Carnegie went to work as a bobbin boy in a cotton mill. He then moved rapidly through a succession of jobs with Western Union and the Pennsylvania Railroad. In 1865, he resigned to establish his own business enterprises and eventually organized the Carnegie Steel Company, which launched the steel industry in Pittsburgh. At age sixty-five, he sold the company to J. P. Morgan for $480 million and devoted the rest of his life to his philanthropic activities and writing, including his autobiography. One of Carnegie's lifelong interests was the establishment of free public libraries to make available to everyone a means of self-education. There were only a few public libraries in the world when, in 1881, Carnegie began to promote his idea. He and the Corporation subsequently spent over $56 million to build 2,509 libraries throughout the English-speaking world. During his lifetime, Carnegie gave away over $350 million. He died in Lenox, Massachusetts, on August 11, 1919.

Alexander Gardnerwas born in Paisley, Renfew, Scotland on 17th October, 1821. He found employment as a photographer with Matthew Brady. Gardner was an expert in the new collodion (wet-plate process) that was rapidly displacing the daguerreotype. Gardner specialized in making what became known as Imperial photographs. These large prints (17 by 20 inches) were very popular and Brady was able to sell them for between $50 and $750, depending on the amount of retouching with india ink that was required. Soon after arriving back from the front Matthew Brady decided to make a photographic record of the American Civil War. He sent Gardner, James Gardner, Timothy O'Sullivan, William Pywell, George Barnard, and eighteen other men to travel throughout the country taking photographs of the war. Each one had his own travelling darkroom so that that collodion plates could be processed on the spot. This included Gardner's famous President Lincoln on the Battlefield of Antietamand Home of a Rebel Sharpshooter (1863).

On March 6, 1831, General Philip Sheridan ,one of the greatest Union generals in the American Civil War, was born. We know he was the son of Irish immigrants, but his place of birth is uncertain, with Albany, New York; somewhere in Ohio; at sea; and County Cavan, Ireland, all rumored as his birthplace. Less uncertain is his place among Union generals; he was one of the finest of the war. Sheridan was only a 2nd lieutenant when the Civil War began. On May 25, 1862, he was appointed colonel of the 2nd Michigan Cavalry. By September Sheridan was a brigadier general; in March '63 he made major general.

The brilliant assault of his command on Missionary Ridge brought him to the attention of U.S. Grant. In spring 1864, Grant brought Sheridan to Washington and put him in charge of all the cavalry of the Army of the Potomac. In the East he showed the same aggressiveness he had in the West, seeking confrontations with Stuart's cavalry. His troopers killed Confederate cavalry commander J.E.B. Stuart at Yellow Ford in May. Later that year Grant gave the 33-year-old Sheridan an independent command in the Shenandoah Valley. There Sheridan made his famous ride to the battlefield of Cedar Creek, saving his imperiled army.

Returning to Grant's army, Sheridan was instrumental in the victory at Five Forks, which sealed the fate of Richmond, and later he cut off Lee's retreat at Appomattox. After the war he rose to full general and commanded the entire army. Philip Sheridan died on August 5, 1888, in Nonquitt, Massachusetts, and was buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

Audie Murphy , son of poor Texas sharecroppers, rose to national fame as the most decorated U.S. combat soldier of World War II. Among his 33 awards and decorations was the Medal of Honor, the highest military award for bravery that can be given to any individual in the United States of America, for "conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty." He also received every decoration for valor that his country had to offer, some of them more than once, including 5 decorations by France and Belgium. Credited with either killing over 240 of the enemy while wounding and capturing many others, he became a legend within the 3rd Infantry Division. Beginning his service as an Army Private, Audie quickly rose to the enlisted rank of Staff Sergeant, was given a "battle field" commission as 2nd Lieutenant, was wounded three times, fought in 9 major campaigns across the European Theater, and survived the war.

During Murphy's 3 years active service as a combat soldier in World War II, Audie became one of the best fighting combat soldiers of this or any other century. What Audie accomplished during this period is most significant and probably will never be repeated by another soldier, given today's high-tech type of warfare. The U.S. Army has always declared that there will never be another Audie Murphy.

Scots

Scots in the US Civil War 79th New York Highlanders

Seven Munroes faced Pitcairn's British redcoats on Lexington Green on April 19, 1775.

Commodore John Barrythe "other "father" of the US Navy . Few Americans are well-acquainted with the gallantry and heroic exploits of Philadelphia's Irish-born naval commander, Commodore John Barry. Obscured by his contemporary, naval commander John Paul Jones, Barry remains to this day an unsung hero of the young American Republic.

Captain Myles Keogh For his exploits in the vital battle of Gettysburg (1st - 3rd July 1863), Keogh was awarded the brevet rank of major. At the Battle of Little Bighorn 25 June 1876, Myles Keogh, the senior captain that day fell in a "last stand" of his own in a group of troopers

Scottish-American Military Society The Scottish-American Military Society (SAMS) was founded and chartered in North Carolina, April 12, 1981, as a non-profit organization to preserve and promote Scottish and American Armed Forces customs, traditions, and heritage.

General Influence

“History credits the Rev. Elijah Craig, a Baptist minister, with being the first in 1789 to make bourbon.” He was a Scotsman. Kentucky is the place for bourbon because of the limestone which makes the water almost iron-free. “The first bourbon recognized by brand outside of Kentucky probably was produced by Dr. James Crow...a Scotsman who settled near the Rev. Craig’s place.” He was known by the locals as Jim Crow.

Missouri Celts (excerpt) With the Louisiana purchase the new nation doubled in size, and many Anglo-Americans, mostly of Ulster-Scottish (the often mislabeled “Scots-Irish”), Scottish, Welsh and other groups from the British Isles (Cornish, Manx) moved to the new territory for the promise of land and a bright future. These first “Americans” brought with them their own particular customs and folk life from the Appalachian Mountains, which was settled predominately by the Ulster-Scots. Ulster culture greatly influenced Appalachia and the Ozarks in many aspects including folklore, music, religion, speech and a commitment to political liberty. First arriving along the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers, they would soon press into the Ozark Mountains south and west, heralding the permanent settlement of Missouri (Continued on the site) Edinburg(h), Caledonia, Kilwinning, Maidenkirk and Ayreshire. Other Scottish names include Aberdeen, Argyle, Athol, Edina, Montrose and Alba. Many counties are named after Scots and Ulster-Scots, including Buchanan, Mercer, Knox and St. Clair counties.

Scots-Irish in Tennessee. According to the Tennessee census bureau, one in five Tennesseans can trace their roots directly to the Scots-Irish settlers of the 18th century. Most of these settlers are of Ulster Protestant/Presbyterian stock who were forced under British rule to flee their country.

Flora MacDonald, savior of Bonnie Prince Charlie, emigrated to North Carolina before siding with the British in the American Revolution, and returning to Scotland.

Wales and America: a paper written by John Davies, Professor Emeritus , University of Wales

Welsh impact on America: Was America named after Richard Amerik, one of the chief investors in the second transatlantic voyage of John Cabot? Was Pennsylvania named for the Welsh Quakers? ("I chose New Wales, being as this, a pretty, hilly country, but Penn being Welsh for head as in Penmanmoire (sic), in Wales, and Penrith, in Cumberland, and Penn, in Buckinghamshire . . . called this Pennsylvania, which is the high or head woodlands...William Penn)

Elihu Yale, the son of Welsh immigrant parents who settled in Boston, founded Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut

Howell Powell, who left Brecon for Virginia in 1642 was one of the first Welsh settlers in America. Most emigration from Wales until the late 17th century had been on an individual basis, but after 1660 when Charles II was restored to the English throne, he instigated a wave of religious intolerance which threatened the rights of several groups to worship in the way that they chose, and significant numbers of people - in some cases, whole communities - began to leave Wales. The Court of Great Sessions in Bala, north Wales threatened to burn Quakers, prompting the Welsh Quakers to acquire land (approximately 40,000 acres) in and around what is now Pennsylvania. They emigrated there in 1682.

But south Wales provided most of the emigrants to America in the 19th century. The growth of the iron industry in the valleys from the mid 18th century and the later development of the south Wales coalfield, meant that south Wales had a reserve of skilled metalworkers, foundrymen and miners who could find work easily in the rapidly expanding industrial areas of America, like Scranton, Pennsylvania. Welsh and Irish in Pennsylvania mines," The Old Country in the New World"

The NWC is an all-inclusive 501 (c) (3) charitable benevolent society. The New World Celts is not to be confused with, nor to be associated with and never will be associated with any racist organization. We are very proud of our members of Celtic heritage and equally proud of our members of Native American, African and Asian heritage. We disavow wholeheartedly any connection with or attempts by any racist organization to link themselves to us via the internet or by using our name or symbols to further their own cause. We are very proud to be Americans, Australians, Canadians, and New Zealanders and as such, aspire to the golden ideals of ancient Celts: that all are equals.